


Simple Things

by perductus



Series: Togafuka Week 2014 [1]
Category: Dangan Ronpa
Genre: F/M, Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-30
Updated: 2014-09-30
Packaged: 2018-02-19 08:47:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,124
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2382233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perductus/pseuds/perductus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being a father isn't as easy as Byakuya Togami thought.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Simple Things

Screaming drifted through from the adjacent room. Any hope Byakuya held that he might sleep instantly dispersed as his consciousness was kicked into action.

A sigh escaped him as he groggily extended an arm to the other side of the bed to poke the heap of sheets next to him.

‘…Touko.’

The pile of sheets did not budge.

Grudgingly, Byakuya pried his eyelids open and turned his head. The only evidence that there was anyone else in the bed with him at all was the crown of a messy head of hair, just visible in the nest of blankets.

Next door’s wailing increased in urgency, and Byakuya prodded Touko’s sleeping form again.

‘Touko, he’s crying again.’

The lump shifted. A low groan emitted.

‘Fukawa.’

Byakuya waited for Touko to emerge. She didn’t.

‘Useless,’ he muttered, throwing the covers off his body and extracting himself from the bed.

Leaving Touko curled up in the sheets, mumbling unintelligible rubbish under her breath, Byakuya exited the bedroom.

Entering the room next door, the source of the wailing grew louder. A cot stood in the corner of the room, lined with blankets and a number of small soft toy animals. Inside the cot, a small figure, barely visible in the dim light of early morning, clutched the bars at the side. The child’s body shook with sobs, the cot rattling slightly as chubby fingers grabbed at the walls of his cage.

Byakuya stood in the doorway, cautiously eyeing the child.

His child.

His and Touko’s child.

The child screamed again.

Byakuya strode to the cot and gingerly plucked the child from it, holding him with outstretched arms. Small legs kicked the air, while he continued to expel noise, tears and snot running down his round face.

Completely disgusted, Byakuya cautiously brought his son towards him, holding him against his chest, allowing the child to sniffle and dribble all over his shoulder.

‘You’re just like your mother,’ he muttered.

The only response was a series of snuffles.

Whenever possible, Byakuya left the physical parenting to Touko, meaning he didn’t often hold his son. It wasn’t that he didn’t feel anything towards the child, but the notion of caring for another human was on a completely new level, a level he’d never expected nor prepared for. It was—

…frightening is a strong word. So… wary. He was wary. Wary of the responsibility upon him. Upon Touko. Upon them both.

Byakuya’s parents hadn’t exactly been loving. They could barely be called parents at all. A mother who was just another face in the crowd, and a father who was more of an authority figure than a parental one. Of course, for Byakuya this was normal life. He didn’t question it, and never mourned the kind of childhood others he met later in life experienced.

Touko didn’t like to talk about her parents, but on the rare occasion she divulged snippets of backstory, all Byakuya gathered was that her upbringing was largely doting parent free.

Neither of them, then, seemed particularly cut out for parenthood. As Touko’s pregnancy progressed, Byakuya’s thoughts dwelled on the possibility that they would not be good parents, or that their child might rebel, run away or worse. Even the thought that the child might take after Touko’s other self crossed his mind, but that was soon crushed deep into his subconscious, along with the rest of the questions. That didn’t even bare thinking about.

Of course, he revealed none of this to Touko or anyone else. He barely admitted this to himself, because surely he – Byakuya Togami – would be just as talented at something as simple as being a father as he was at every other thing life threw at him?

Well. Turns out being a parent isn’t like every other thing. Funny that.

‘Is… is he sleeping…?’

Byakuya tilted his head to see Touko standing in the doorway, hair a complete rats nest and nightgown barely clinging to her right shoulder. She squinted; clearly not awake enough to bother finding her glasses.

‘I don’t know,’ he answered. ‘He’s stopped crying for the moment.’

Her sleep-deprived features allowed a small smile. She moved into the room and extended her arms. ‘I c-can hold him.’

Byakuya lifted the sniffling child off his shoulder with caution and passed him to Touko, as if passing a bomb, which might start screaming and crying again if mishandled.

Touko gathered their son into her arms bouncing him gently, kissing his forehead at periodic intervals. The small hiccups of imminent sobs began to ebb away and before Byakuya knew it, the child was fast asleep against Touko’s chest. 

‘H-He’s asleep now,’ Touko whispered, eyes fixed on the baby.

Byakuya ran a hand through his hair, which must look just as scruffy as Touko’s. ‘It won’t last.’

‘No…'

Both of them stared at the baby. Their baby.

Of all the things Byakuya did over the years, none of them were simple. Simple wasn’t a word in a Togami’s vocabulary. If you were a Togami you did extraordinary things, marvelous things, ground breaking things. Not simple things. Never simple things.

As a Togami, these remarkable things you did were easy. Easy, to accumulate one million yen in an afternoon. Easy, to battle through sibling after sibling to claim the crown. Easy, to hold the title to the Togami family.

Simple things however, were not.

Falling in love hadn’t been easy. Not for him. Not him, who barely knew what love was coming from a family that could barely be called a family at all.

Having a child – well, of course they say it’s difficult but it’s what everyone does. If everyone does it, then that means it’s common. Simple. A simpleton could raise a child.

To be faced with something that millions of people do all of the time, and to be scared by it? It was unnerving. It wasn’t simple at all.

Touko gently lowered the child back into his cot, arranging the blankets around his small body, resting a small cuddly rabbit in his tiny arms. She stifled a yawn.

‘We should sleep,’ said Byakuya. He placed a hand on Touko’s shoulder. ‘There’s no point standing here waiting for him to wake up again.’

Eyes fixed on the cot; Touko raised her hand, placing it atop his. ‘Yes…’

Byakuya steered Touko to the door, from where she slouched back to their bedroom. He paused, glancing back at the motionless child in the cot.

He would never admit it, but this was proving to be the hardest task yet.

Some fool said that the most important tasks were the hardest. And that fool would be right. Being extraordinary was easy. Being normal was not. And being a father was the hardest thing of all.

**Author's Note:**

> this is a bit rubbish cos I started it AGES ago and then forgot about it then rushed to finish it for Togafuka week which is a WONDERFUL WEEK INDEED


End file.
